An Observation, Gripe, Or Confusion?

Some time back, I ordered some supplies through a dealer that has an online store.

After 30 days, the hold on my credit card expired. The item never shipped and when the company said they would ship when they got it in stock (after waiting 30 days), I cancelled my order.

Today, looking at the premium Mystic Premium Heirloom "ships in 30 days" according to the Mystic site. (The $39.95 non-premium version ships in 7-10 days).

Then, looking at iHobb, I see that a lot of the White Ace items are out of stock and pending restocking in mid-May. Been that way for quite a while.

I guess I'm just wondering if some of these products are actually print on demand, are the companies simply sold out, or are they challenged at inventory and maintaining stock.

I may be a bit off, but it seems that between what I've been personally experiencing with supplies, and what I'm reading on websites, this wait of a month or more seems to be becoming a tad more common place.

Am I daft? Is a month (or more) an acceptable wait time in this day and age? Am I missing something? Or am I just complaining out of turn (wouldn't be the first time)?

You should directly check with their manufacturers since some of them also sell directly to buyers as well as distributors. If their very own manufacturers don't know then probably no one else knows any more better than them.

My guess is that some places are ordering the items from their suppliers only after receiving an order - at least for some things. I'm really not familiar with the supplies business, so I can't say anything for certain, but from the outside looking in I'd think it would be hard to forecast demand for certain things. I'm sure they keep frequently sold items in stock (mounts, popular albums and supplements, etc) but they probably don't want to get stuck holding the bag on things like expensive specialty albums if there are no buyers.

While I tend to agree, two things strike me as odd.

The 30-days shipping on the Premium Heirloom is from Mystic itself, not a vendor. Similarly, I at one time wanted to order some Vatican pages directly from White Ace. They were out of stock with no estimation on when they might be available.

It does make me wonder how much business, like mine, they lose when they can't deliver in a timely fashion.

It sounds like they are either using a printing contractor that has a backlog, or aging your order on purpose in order to accumulate enough like orders to justify a print run.

Mystic is usually quick, so I'd guess this is an aberration for them. I'm sure they do run out of things from time to time, but I'm pretty sure Mystic doesn't actually manufacture anything. I assume all of the Mystic-branded items are printed and manufactured by suppliers and sometimes those suppliers might have a long lead time for various reasons. I doubt they'll be out of stock on one of their premium albums for very long and I would assume those are something they try to keep in stock if they can. But again, this is just me speculating.